thusiasm either for the
gratification or the denial of her ambitions. As for the two men, they
had grown thin on self-indulgence.

"Fill up your glasses, girls," said Arthur.

"Fill up," echoed Jack. "Is there time for another bottle?" he added
anxiously.

"This cheese is very good," commented Arthur.

"Delicious," the other agreed.

"You two seem to think of nothing but eating and drinking," said Jenny
distastefully.

"Oh, no, we think of other things, don't we, Jack?" contradicted the
older brother, with a sort of frigid relish.

"Rather," the younger one corroborated, looking sideways at Jenny.

"We must have a good time this winter," Arthur announced. "We needn't go
back to Paris for a month or two. We must have a good time at our flat
in Victoria."

"London's a much wickeder city than Paris," said Jack, addressing the
air like some pontiff of vice. "I like these November nights with shapes
of women looming up through the fog. A friend of mine----" As Jack Danby
descended to personal reminiscence, he lost his sinister power and
became mean and common. "When I say friend--I should say business
friend, eh, Arthur?" he asked, smiling on the side of his face nearer
to his brother. "Well, he's a lord as a matter of fact," he continued in
accents of studied indifference.

"Tell the girls about him," urged his brother, and "Fill up your
glasses," he murmured as, leaning back in his chair, he seemed to fade
away into clouds of smoke blown from a very long, thin and black cigar.

"This lord--I won't tell you his name----" said Jack, "he wanders about
in fogs until he meets a shape that attracts him. Then he hands her a
velvet mask, and takes her home. What an imagination," chuckled the
narrator.

"Well, I call him a dirty rotter," said Jenny.

"Do you?" asked Jack, as if struck by the novelty of such a point of
view.

The lights were being extinguished now. The quenching of the orange
illumination, and the barren waste of empty tables gave the grill-room a
raffish look which consorted well with the personalities of the two
brothers. The party broke up in the abrupt fashion of England, and
within a few minutes of sitting comfortably round a richly lighted
supper-table, the two girls were seated in a dark taxi on the way to
Camden Town.

"How do you like Jack Danby?" Irene inquired.

"He's all right. Only I don't know--I think if I'd met him last year I'd
have thought him a swine. I think I must be turnin